The real-life Kit Kitterege; my great aunt!

[angelnise]

My grandmother was 10 in 1939, but she was in Yamagata, Japan....that's her birthplace. I've been there, and it made me feel so much closer to her to see her school and everything! I love it when people share their stories!

[MOM to JILLIAN]

Katie,

Thanks for sharing your aunt's story. It was very interesting. The autograph book is a real treasure.

[lovetheoldstuff]

How special that you have a relative who was so similar to Kit. We love Kit at our house. I think her stories are the best!

[Katie from IL]

I just came from an evening at my grandma's apartment. She's 91 and lives alone, but has lived with her younger sister(my great-aunt) until she died in 1999.

My great aunt, my Aunt Sue was 6 years younger than my grandma, and she was born in 1921-2 years before Kit.

But the best part was that as a kid and teenager she was an amazing writer! She wrote tons of poems and articles for her school paper and she even interviewed some famous people while she was in high school in the 1930s.

I found an autograph book that belonged to my aunt at my grandma's(she wouldn't let me keep it) that was FILLED autographs from people like Vivian Leigh, Orson Wells, Talula Bankhead(sp?) and Wrong-Way Corrigan, who flew across either the Atlantic or Pacific(I can't remember) after Lindbergh(Kit would have loved to interview him!).

There were lots of other people I can't remember, some of which I'd never heard of. But there are boxes filled with clippings of articles she wrote for her high school paper and lots of certificates and awards she won, too. And tons of pictures-she was very beautiful and popular.

My grandma did give me a children's library book that my aunt Sue won from reading the most books in some reading contest. Since it was the Depression something like that was a valuable reward. My grandma told me my aunt even won a typewriter, but she gave it to one of my other relatives I think(I'll bet it looked a lot like Kit's)

Unfortunately, after she graduated High School in Chicago in 1939, she had to get a job and work. My grandma said no one in her family could afford college, and even though she got a scholarship she had to work to support herself and family(her mother, 2 sisters and brother), so she never became the writer she could have been.

Unlike Kit, my grandma's family didn't go from rich to poor-they were always poor. They lived near Chicago. But they did get evicted from their house and had to move into a smaller bungalow. My great-grandfather died in the early 1930s as well, causing more financial stress. My grandma, who was older also worked as soon as she graduated in 1933.

<font color="#051E50" size="1">[ March 11, 2006 12:24 AM: Message edited by: Katie from IL ]</font>

[Samantha_Nellie_Felicity]

Wow! What a connection! [img]smile.gif[/img]

[AngieBelle]

That's pretty neat! My grandmother was a bit older than Kit. She and a friend lived sort of like hobos for a little while during the 30s. They hitch-hiked across the country and worked in fields!

I don't have a whole lot of connections to the American Girls because as far as I know, my family was not in this country before the 20th century. I do have a grandfather who fought in WWII, and my mom's brother would be about the age of Brad, maybe a little younger. My mom would be about 12 years younger than Molly.